100 days: Day 36

23/01/2010

Glyn was looking for his keys, in the same places, over and over again, while patting his thighs.

‘Glyn, how long?’ commanded the muffle on the other end of Glyn’s mobile.

‘Left the house five minutes ago, I’ll be there, on time this time,’ he attempted to reassure the voice and himself simultaneously. He found the keys underneath what should have been a discarded pizza box, then he left the flat.

The traffic wasn’t good and to make matters worse it had begun to rain, heavily. His car has no roof. He sat semi-submerged in a jam for about 15 minutes, all the time drafting his excuses. They weren’t up to much, each one more elaborate than the last, each one moving away from a reality that though disappointing was still acceptable.

At a total of half an hour after the agreed meeting time Glyn pulled into the cul-de-sac to find Carol wet and angry.

‘It’s too late,’she muttered the moment his engine stopped.

‘I’m sorry honey I really tried, it’s just traffic was a nightmare and the cat had a hernia, and everything, everything conspired against me getting here. I tried, God knows I tried honey. I’m sorry. I tried,’ his apologies petered out as they failed to illicit a reaction.

‘You know, you know how important this is to me and still you fail, you fail me every time, and now Glyn, now it’s too late, they will have closed by now,’ she didn’t wait for his response and simply walked back into the house and closed the door behind her. That was his last chance. In all honesty he’d lost patience with her, he couldn’t see why she as so wrapped up in it all, she was rubbish at Laser Quest anyway.